Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Age Old Secrets of Healthy Living

I have been regularly keeping you updated on various health topics through a series of my blog. Today’s update is an attempt to explore a hidden secret of health. Though many of us are aware of it, we never bothered to give a serious thought. Let us go into the details now.

To begin with, let us try to understand the term health and the secrets of healthy living. Health for many of us means; living a life free of diseases and illness. But that is not exactly the truth. Being a human, one gets ill and diseases do accrue us. In fact, health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. Millions of micro organisms intrude our body every day through various sources viz. air, water, food etc. We are helpless. We cannot stop them from intruding into our body. We need not worry about their intrusion either; because our body has a separate mechanism to tackle that issue. It has a strong defense mechanism within to counter those micro organisms. Our body fights them from the entry point to the end point in our blood stream. Let us assume that some bacteria have entered in our food. Since they are too minute to see with our naked eyes we ate it. The bacteria have to first wage a war in our mouth while chewing in order to get into our body. The salivary gland releases saliva while chewing not only to give taste to the food but also to battle out the micro entrants. That is the reason why we were told by our parents and elders not to talk while eating and chew the food properly. If the bacteria succeed in entering our stomach, our body releases a very powerful gas called hydrochloric acid. The power of hydrochloric acids not only digests the food but also kills the germs and bacteria intruded. If the bacteria escapes from our stomach and tries to intrude our body, the most efficient and hardworking organ of our body called “Liver” acts as shield and prevent it from entering the bloodstream by killing them. Many of us do not understand the importance of liver. It is the organ which works more than any other organ of the body fighting and killing millions of micro organisms a day. Moreover, we make its work more difficult by eating all kinds of junk food, smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol etc. If at all the bacteria succeeds in giving a skip to our liver and enters our blood stream, the specialized security forces of our body called white blood cells come to our rescue. White blood cells possess fighter cells called Lymphocytes to kill the bacteria intruded in our bloodstream. They attack the bacteria from all corners of the body, surround them and kill them by bombarding various types of chemical elements in the bloodstream. After killing them, they clean the intruders through sweat or urine. There are billions of people who think the medicines and injections given by doctors cure the diseases, which is not at all true. Unless our fighter cells kill the bacteria, we cannot get rid of any disease. Now you might wonder what the medicines do. As told before the fighter cells release some kind of chemical compounds everywhere in the bloodstream in order to stop the bacteria from getting stronger by multiplying. The same job is done by the intake of medicines. It helps the fighter cells in a way by not allowing the bacteria to multiply, so that the fighter cells can kill the intruded bacteria at the earliest.

Many of us often talk about immunity system. Do we really know what an immunity system is? If we go through the definition, “it is a system of biological structures and process within an organism that protect against diseases by identifying and killing pathogens and tumor cells.” In a simple term it is nothing but providing a healthy environment for all the glands and organs that fight the intruding organisms through a good life style and environment. Providing what all the cells, glands and organs of our body need to strengthen and prosper can be termed as an immunity system. Let the bacteria intrude but provide your body the chance to counter them effectively. Improve your immunity system and nothing will come in your way to good health.

According to Dr. Raju, a human being can live past 200 years of age if the proper dharma of nature is followed. There are evidences that our ancient saints and sages lived about 150 years in the past. If we look back to our ancestral history, many of our ancestors have lived over 100 years of age. Our ancestors realized and followed the dharma of nature. They learned the secrets of healthy living and lived accordingly. But today the things are different. The human life span has reduced drastically. We hardly see people surviving past 100 years. The situation is going to worsen if we do not change ourselves and follow the dharma of nature. Living past hundred years is not the real question. How we live during our life span is what matters. Our ancestors lived healthily all along their life span of 100 plus years where as we are getting prone to all kinds of health issues in this short span of life. Refer “Transformation of Human Life Style” for more details in this regards.

Much before the existence of doctors, medical practitioners and health specialists, our ancestors have realized the secrets of happy and healthy living. They followed the dharma of nature and lived long with great health. They preached and taught the same to their successors. In a way, the people of India, China, Nepal, Burma, Sri Lanka and some other parts of Asia are quite lucky as they still follow those principles laid by the ancestors in most of the rural areas and live healthy.

According to our ancestors there are basically three major factors that determine our health status:

(1) The Gene:

The primary factor that determines a person’s health is the gene that is inherited from his parents. A gene holds the information to build and maintain an organism’s cells and pass the genetic traits to offspring. It is the gene inherited from parents that decides most of the human characteristic, structure and make-up of the body. It is the gene inherited from your parents that decides the height of your body, the colour of your eyes, skin and hair etc along with the life span of most of the organs of your body. It is therefore, Dr. Mantena Satyanarayana Raju strictly recommends the young and newly married couple to first make their body perfect by following a natural way of life and then give birth to a healthy baby. He is worried about the generations to come because of the present generation people. Because what we possess goes to the generations to come. Don’t we want to see our children live healthy? We could hardly do anything with the gene inherited from our parents. At least we can stop it from getting worse by following the other two principles or dharma of nature which is by leading a healthy lifestyle in a natural environment.

(2) The Lifestyle: The human life style plays a major role in living healthy. This tool is in our hands unlike the gene. With this tool we can make or ruin our health. Here it is essential to understand what is a healthy lifestyle and unhealthy lifestyle. A healthy life style is determined by two factors 1. Eating natural food and 2. Physical activities.

(a) Eating Natural Food:

We need to eat food that is according to the dharma of our body. A human is not an animal predator by origin. Many of us are in misconception that a human is an animal predator by origin thanks to the images of primitive people we find in our books with bows and arrows in their hands. Many of us forget the fact that we are the result of evolution of apes who were originally plant eaters. Man ate plant food for millions of years till he separated from the forests and had to eat animals for survival. They ate animal food for survival in the past but today we are so much dependent that we cannot imagine of living without eating animal food. Solar cooked food is what we need to eat. Fruits and vegetables are called solar cooked food. Fruits and vegetables possess the inherent energies of sun and soil which is very essential for human body. Unfortunately, the greed of humans has been proving havoc to these foods as well. People are using unnatural methods of growing these plants using various deadly chemicals in order to gain more profits. With the development of science and technology, man has learned various methods of cultivation and cooking techniques. The raw and half boiled food has been replaced with hundreds of varieties of processing and cooking methods killing the original nutrient qualities of food. The nutritional value has been replaced with flavor and taste. In a way people of current generation are addicted to taste minus nutrition. With liberalization the food culture in countries like India, China, Nepal, Burma and many other nations have also affected. Western Junk food culture has replaced the age old traditional nutritious food of these places. I still remember when I was a kid; there were no junk food centers like bakeries and other fast food centers etc. We used to have sesame seed balls, groundnut balls, boiled peas and all sorts of seasoned fruits like guava, gooseberry, raspberry, chikoo, pomegranate, mango, bananas, sugarcanes etc. We used to buy any of these things during our school days. All sorts of fruit juices were available for us. There were hardly any chubby boys/girls in our class those days. We were able to point out a few chubby boys/girls on finger tips. Today the situation is totally opposite. There are hardly 4-5 slimmer boys/girls in a classroom of 80-100 students these days. Those fruits stalls and healthy food centers were replaced by junk fast food and bakery centers. If you close your eyes for a moment and think what you ate in the last one month, your list includes, puffs, burgers, pizzas, ice creams, chocolates, soft drinks, oil fried potato chips, vadas and bhujiyas, Chinese fried rice, noodles, pulavs and biryanis etc. You hardly find fruits and juices in your menu. Unless we get back to our roots and follow the eating habits of our ancestors we are not going to remain healthy.

(b) Physical Activities:

Earlier people used to work hard to earn their livelihood irrespective of regions and nations. With the advent of science and technology the machines replaced labour giving comforts to the people. With the changing times the nature of work has changed. Machines made by humans made their work easy. The work load of human limbs declined and the work load of his brain increased. The body remains healthy only if you use your brain and body equally. Due to excess use of brain and minimal use of body the modern day man is undergoing a tremendous amount of stress and trauma. People living in metropolitan cities of major parts of the world are suffering from mental stress and trauma. In order to avoid any such physical and mental disorders it is always recommended to practice any sort of physical exercises like walking, jogging, cycling, gym, Yoga etc. for at least an hour a day and practice meditation techniques in addition to it.

The major part of modern day generation is leading a very unhealthy lifestyle by eating all sorts of junk food with less or almost no physical activities. Here I am going to tell you what Dr. Raju’s Natural Way of Living is? Dr. Raju realized that people are getting prone to all sorts of diseases viz., Diabetes, High Cholesterol, Heart Attacks and Obesity etc. at a very tender age of mid 20’s. Dr. Raju realized the importance to take up a mission to educate people and eradicate the root cause of diseases. People are getting insured against ill-health but they are not insuring their health. Dr. Raju’s natural way of living is an insurance of one’s good health. He declared a battle against the addicted unhealthy lifestyles of people. In the current scenario, where one’s own son is not in a position to listen his father, Dr. Raju has started his journey to change the entire society with his preaching on health science. 20 years ago he started his lone journey to change the society. Today, he has grown like a big banyan tree giving shadow to millions of followers. He is doing that service which a doctor is unable to do. A doctor can help you cure a disease but Dr. Raju helps you eradicate the root cause of the disease. He is revealing all the secrets of medical science and explaining the ways to eradicate the diseases. He is educating people that a medicine can cure a disease but it cannot prevent from reoccurring. The disease can be prevented permanently only through change in life style. Natural Way of Living not only cures the current diseases but also prevents from reoccurring it. He is trying to make people realize the urgent need of following Natural Way of Living of our ancestors before it’s too late.

(3) The Environment:

The third major factor of good health is environment. No matter how good is your gene or how good is your life style, the environment you live in must also be equally good to stay fit and healthy. Unfortunately, the people living in metropolitan cities have forgotten this dharma of nature. The jungle of tree in metro cities was replaced by a jungle concrete. They are axing the trees which protect us from pollution by absorbing carbon-dioxide and releasing the most vital oxygen. Whenever a man tried to go against the nature, he witnessed severe natural disorders and calamities. Global warming, Tsunami, Floods, Earth Quakes and recent Volcanic Eruptions of Ice Land arefew such examples of natural disasters created by mankind. Many of our ancient yogis and saints realized the importance of trees and suggested plantation of major trees like Neem, Banyan and Peepal in every household and temple premises. Apart from oxygen, these trees provide us the divine prana or life energy that is very useful for our health. By passing through these trees or touching those trees the prana flows into our body and cures several unknown diseases. This is not at all a myth. Every tree has a pranic aura just like a human being. If sick people are brought near any of the banyan, peepal or neem tree and sought the prana from those trees, the person might recover early. Since I learn and practice pranic healing, I can feel the aura of trees and humans. For many of you, it might look like a bluff. Every living being has an aura or an etheric invisible body. It can be felt and seen by practice. Great saints can see the aura where as others can practice and feel the aura. Without going much into discussion about aura I would like to conclude that living around greener environment keeps you healthy.

Mantena Satyanarayana Raju’s Natural Way of Living is nothing but a recall to the living habits of our ancient times. Prevention is always better than cure technique. Do follow the dharma of nature and live healthy. Do write in your valuable comments, opinions, suggestions and views to make me move further. Keep watching the space for updates…..